40 Days of Awesome: Day 8

When I was young we had a long, faux chestnut cabinet which held the record player and enough room inside for LPs and 45s. I remember it, because other than playing some BBC children’s LP (and even then mostly the Doctor Who theme) it scared me, or rather the music that often blared out from it at silly o’clock in the morning scared me. That was when various family members would arrive home from the pub and decide to play records as loudly as possible. All along the street you could hear the music roaring out through the night, as if it was some sort of competition.

I digress.

The only song I can remember which never made me clasp my hands over my ears and mutter “Turn it down” was Wuthering Heights by Kate Bush. Even now, looking back, I think I was able to understand the beauty in the lyric and the sweeping instruments, but what really struck me was the vocal range and performance of the then 17 year old Kate Bush.

Our paths didn’t cross for many years, until one day I bought her greatest hits The Whole Story. The rest, as they say in France, was histoire.

Kate Bush was and is not only a fine singer/songwriter, but an actress and performer and it is those qualities which make you believe she can be the cheated wife in Babooshka, the frightened yet vengeful child in Cloudbustin‘, the doting wife providing comfort and strength to her husband in Don’t Give Up and the haunted lover in that first hit record all those years ago.